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Let’s face it, hiking is great and all, but most of you would love to take pictures of the amazing scenery that nature has to offer to show to friends, for yourself to watch and reminisce of the great times you had and sometimes even to sell. If you want to get the best pictures though, there are a couple of things that you would have to do to achieve the desired results. One of them would be go get a really good camera, the second thing is to practice working with it and the last one would be to pick the best possible tripod which is suitable for hiking and backpacking. Unfortunately most of the tripods that are being sold these days are not really suitable for hiking for more than one reason and in this article, we’ll try to go over the best choice whatever your price range is.

After all if you’re bringing your DSLR camera which costs 1000$ with you, you wouldn’t want to put it on a flimsy tripod which will fall leaving your thousands dollar camera shattered, just because a little breeze appeared out of nowhere. Most tripods these days are made to get a stable position for your camera, but not all of them are suitable for the rough conditions that hikers would put them through and that’s why we’re going to give you a list of tripods which can withstand these rough conditions.

The upper range of professional tripods for hiking which cost a bit more than the others, you’ll first get familiar with the choice of the professional photographers which take scenery pictures.

The first hiking tripod we’re going to review is the Gitzo GT0531 Series 0 6X Carbon Fiber 3-Section Tripod

Gitzo GT0531 Series 0 6X Carbon Fiber 3-Section Tripod

This tripod has all the features anyone could ever have from a tripod, even for hiking. It offers stability, mobility, it’s compact and really lightweight. Here are some of the features that the manufacturer has listed as important with this particular model

The Gitzo GT0531 Series 0 6X Carbon Fiber 3-Section Tripod with G-Lock – Replaces GT0530is not really the highest priced tripod you would find available, but surely does the work that the most expensive ones would without a problem. It’s weight capacity is up to 11.02 lbs or nearly 5 kilograms, which is definitely enough if you don’t have an enormous lens. Glitzo is actually a household name when it comes to camera accessories and equipment and you can trust us when we tell you that with this particular model they’ve outdone themselves. This particular model includes built-in Anti Leg Rotation ,which is actually now a feature of the whole carbon fiber range. The tripods for professional hikers have been further improved with features and details that increase performance, versatility and quality.

The next model we’re reviewing is the Gitzo GT1544T Traveler Tripod (Black)

Gitzo GT1544T Traveler Tripod (Black)

The price here is actually quite a bit higher starting at around $600 but you get a quite a few features more from this model and if you’re really serious about getting high quality pictures you might want to consider this model as well. It is higher than the GT0531. The GT1544T is actually the small brother of the Gitzo GT1544T Series 1 6X Carbon Fiber Traveler 4 Section G-Lock Tripod for Cameras model which is also a great model, with about $100 lower price, but there’s a difference in the features they offer as well.

This model offers the following features as well as many others whic professional photographers would love, which we’ll talk about below:

Made from 6X carbon fiber

Shorter column to allow lower minimum height

G Lock leg locks

Reversable center column

Anti leg rotation

This carbon fiber tripod for hikers weights just around 2 pounds or 900 grams, but this one could hold up to 17 pounds or nearly 8 kilograms which makes it one of the tripods which could hold the most weight. This carbon fiber product is so solid and I can’t actually write a better description of it than the makers which say it is “The GT1544T is a strong, stable yet extremely compact and lightweight carbon fiber tripod, designed to balance uncompromising professional support with ease of transport for traveling photographers.”

This is the best model Glitzo currently offers and has little to no competition even in the high class. You can rest assured that this tripod will be a great companion on all your hiking trips and it would provide your camera however big it is with the stability and a peace of mind for you, that you’re putting $2000 or $3000 on a safe spot.

The Oben CT-3561 Carbon Fiber Tripod With BE-117T Ball Head for hiking

Oben CT-3561 Carbon Fiber Tripod With BE-117T Ball Head

The next model which we have is also in the 200-400 dollar price range at around $350 it’s not exactly cheap, but we’re still in the high end tripods so keep reading. This model is not by Glitzo as the name suggests but here are some of the features that the manufacturers from Oben have specified as important to the regular user.

Load Capacity: 17.6 lb

Maximum Height: 64.3″

Lightweight: 3.1 lb

Folds Down to 16.8″

5 Sections

Detachable Leg and Column Form Monopod

Rubber Feet & Metal Spikes

Arca-Type Quick-Release Plate

Separate Panning Lock

2 x Bubble Levels

Limited 5-Year Warranty

As you can already see the Oben tripod for hikers has a couple of features that separate it from the two models mentioned above. For example compared to the first model from Glitz, this tripod could hold up to 17 pounds which compares to the $600 model, but it does weight almost twice as much as the GT1554T and it only has 5 sections compared to the 6 sections of the GT1554. The maximum height is also lower at 64.3 inches.

So if you are a professional photographer who’s looking for the best gear – which comes at a price, these tripods would do wonders for your photos, but like we said they do come at prices varying between 200 and 600 USD, which makes them a niche commodity that probably only the professional photographers and the wannabe’s would probably buy.

Wishing you lots of great photos on your next hiking trip – The Hiking Gear Guru

After quite a while of research and a lot of broken DSLR cameras on our hiking trips ( well not many but a couple of DSLR’s and you know how expensive these are ), we ended up coming with a list of the best hiking cameras for you. The list contains our top picks for cameras that will withstand weather factors as well as some rock hitting as most of the cameras on our review have really rugged design which makes them perfect for that.

Hopefully you’ll like that list as much as you do with this guide of the best backpacking tripods and we at the HikingGearGuru HQ will love to hear what you guys have to say about our camera picks in the comments of the page. Please feel free to share this article with other people who love hiking and backpacking!

Hopefully with the help of our tripod and camera guides you will end up taking some amazing photos that we could share here on our website!